We’ll find out Wednesday if Speaker Mike Johnson can cross off something—anything—from his long to-do list this week.
The House meets Wednesday morning to vote on a procedural step to advance three legislative priorities: government spy powers that expire Thursday, the farm bill, and a budget resolution for immigration enforcement funding.
But after a weeks-long standoff over how to proceed on reauthorizing Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the sweeping agricultural policy bill and the budget framework, House Republican leadership doesn’t appear to have the votes to advance anything.
And some House and Senate Republicans want President Donald Trump to get involved to break the stalemates.
Here are the battles Johnson is facing within his own caucus and the Senate:
— FISA: A growing number of House Republicans are livid Congress is barreling toward a three-year FISA extension with a House plan Senate Majority Leader John Thune has warned is “dead on arrival.”
“Our team has spent too much time with approximately 10 of our members who want compromises the other 210 don’t want,” Rep. Don Bacon said. “Meanwhile there’s about 40 Dems who are willing to support. This is dysfunction.”
As the House activity flounders, the Senate is negotiating its own FISA extension, multiple senators told POLITICO. Members are currently looking at a three-year extension paired with some changes, according to three senators. But Sen. John Kennedy warned that there was “heartburn” over that length for an extension, adding: “I don’t think we have the votes in the Senate.”
Even if the House is able to move the procedural rule Wednesday, the Senate won’t swallow a ban on central banking digital currency attached to the measure upon passage.
“That’s not happening,” Thune said in an interview about linking the two matters.
— FARM BILL: Rep. Chip Roy sent the first warning Tuesday night that the rule’s fate was at risk. GOP leaders’ plan to tack on language green-lighting year-round sales of E15 gasoline blend was “E15 crap,” he said, adding it is still a problem with conservative hardliners.
Rep. Lauren Boebert later announced she would vote against the rule after many of her amendments for rural constituents introduced in the Rules hearing were voted down.
House GOP leaders’ plan to simply add E15 legislation to the farm bill is also looking dead on arrival in the Senate. Privately, GOP senators and aides told POLITICO they’re going to write their own farm bill and haven’t agreed to add the E15 language to it, as they feel that provision won’t clear the chamber.
— IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT: Johnson tried to press his members in a closed-door meeting Monday night to approve the narrow, Senate-approved budget resolution as-is that would set up a path to fund immigration enforcement. The Department of Homeland Security funding lapsed more than two months ago.
Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith, who wants a more expansive bill to fund the department — as do other key House GOP chairs — declined to say if he would support the measure if Johnson put it on the floor in its narrow form.
“I’m just listening to all the conversations,” Smith said in a brief interview.
Johnson can only lose a couple of votes on the rule Wednesday with full attendance.
What else we’re watching:
— WARSH VOTE IN SENATE BANKING — Few if any Democrats are expected to support Kevin Warsh when the Senate Banking panel takes up his nomination to serve as Fed chair Wednesday. The panel is still expected to advance Trump’s pick to replace outgoing Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, putting him on a glide path to confirmation. But Warsh’s potential lack of Democratic support stands in stark contrast to Powell’s years as a bipartisan force on the Hill.
— WHAT MEMBERS WILL ASK HEGSETH — Republicans and Democrats see Pete Hegseth’s hearing before the House Armed Services panel Wednesday as a rare chance to get direct, public answers from the Defense secretary. The hearing is Hegseth’s first congressional testimony outside of classified sessions since the start of the Iran conflict.
Jordain Carney, Jasper Goodman, Victoria Guida and Leo Shane III contributed to this report.
